


the truth

by Jelly



Series: what we say (and what we don't) [2]
Category: The Dragon Prince (Cartoon)
Genre: F/M, THROUGH THE MOON SPOILERS, sometimes you gotta break a few hearts before you can mend them
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-16
Updated: 2020-09-16
Packaged: 2021-03-06 20:42:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,732
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26495068
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jelly/pseuds/Jelly
Summary: “I don’t love you,” she whispers. It tears through the silence, out of place and untrue, a plea to herself, perhaps, more than anything else.“Stop then."(She doesn't).**Spoilers for Through the Moon. Proceed with caution.**
Relationships: Callum/Rayla (The Dragon Prince)
Series: what we say (and what we don't) [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1926241
Comments: 11
Kudos: 104





	the truth

_ the truths _

**56a**

_ “Do you still love me?” _

_ “No.” _

It’s a lie and Callum knows it’s one because when he kisses her, she kisses back. It’s been a month, maybe. Perhaps a little less. He doesn’t know. He doesn’t care. The days of flying for hours on end are a blur in his memory, but they don’t matter anyway because she wasn’t in them, and he doesn’t give a damn that they were the longest, hardest days of his life.

There’d been yelling when he found her—oh, how there’d been  _ yelling _ —and tears, and accusations he’s not proud of (because, at the end of all things, she was the one who’d left in the dead of the night, the one who lied, the one who’s  _ still lying _ , and he’s tired and hurt and  _ heartbroken _ ) but she loves him still, and he knows that she does, because they wouldn’t be in the alley like this if she didn’t.

He wouldn’t be the one against the wall. She wouldn’t have pinned him to it. Her lips wouldn’t be fevered, and frenzied, and fervent, and her hands wouldn’t be fists in his lapels. She  _ must _ love him still, because her kisses are desperate, all tongue and teeth, and they’d kissed so often before, but never like this—never so thoroughly, so  _ dangerously _ , and that must mean something but—

“I don’t love you,” she whispers. It tears through the silence, out of place and untrue, a plea to herself, perhaps, more than anything else. “Callum, I don't—I—”

“Stop then,” he dares her, pulling back. His breath shakes on the exhale. The lump in his throat hurts and he waits, afraid, for one terrifying moment, that she will—

But then her lips are on his again and he knows—he  _ knows _ —that it’s not true, and she  _ does _ still love him, and he knew it, he  _ knew _ it—

And then it’s over. She wrenches herself out his arms, her head bowed to hide the redness of her lips and the tears on her cheeks, and she’s stalking away from him before he can stop her, her footsteps heavy and purposeful and reluctant, all at once.

Callum scrambles after her. Makes a grab for her hand and misses as he trips over in his haste. “Rayla—”

“We’re done, Callum,” she snaps, but her voice breaks around his name. “We're—we’re done. I don't—I don’t love you anymore, so—”

“Don’t you?”

She looks away, ashamed, unable to finish the sentence because they both know it’s not true. She takes a breath instead, and it trembles as it leaves her. “We’re done,” she whispers once more. “Goodbye, Callum.”

Then she’s gone.

Callum’s heart thuds in his chest. He doesn’t follow.

  
  


**56b**

The finality of it feels cold in his chest. Mostly, he’s just stunned. He’d kissed her last night because he didn’t believe her— _ “I don’t love you,” _ she’d said, but he’d grown accustomed to the way shifts in her expressions months ago, and he’d  _ known _ it was a lie the moment it left her lips—but she’s gone again now, and Callum’s at a loss.

He supposes he should go home. Ez probably needs him, and there’s nothing out here for him now that Rayla’s gone, now that they’re—Callum swallows—now that they’re  _ done. _ What is there left to do but turn back and move on?

He pulls his things together in silence. There’s not much. Just his pack, his sketchbook, and a little pouch of silver, and her letter, of course, creased and wrinkled and torn a little at the corners from the hours he’d spent reading and rereading it in her absence. His chest is hollower now than it was when she’d first left because at least then he’d been angry and heartbroken and desperate for answers, but now…

Now he’s just numb.

He slings the pack onto his back. Slips the strap of the sketchbook over his head and under his arm. Heads out of town and to a little clearing down by the river to summon his wings. To the west of here is home, but the idea of going back without her feels foreign and unfamiliar. He’d never entertained the idea that she’d refuse; had never even considered that she’d end things because she’d promised, in her letter, that she was sorry and she loved him still, with all of her heart, and yet—

_ “I don’t love you.” _

_ “Stop then.” _

She hadn’t.

Callum’s heart beats once. He sets his jaw. He takes a breath.

He goes east.

  
  


**56c**

The next time he sees her, it’s by accident. 

It’s been six months. Callum hardly believes it. He’s been looking for her the whole time, of course, drifting from town to town following the stories of a lone Moonshadow elf and the rumours of dark magic, and while the days are long and the nights are restless, the lines between them blur together until Callum loses track of the date altogether. It’s only when the snow starts to fall that he realizes how long it’s been. 

He’s picked up a few tricks along the way. He’s got more under his belt than just three spells now, and though he was never particularly good at hand to hand combat, he can combine the skills Rayla and Soren taught him now with magic, and he’s not so defenseless anymore. She would be proud, he thinks, if she could see him now.

He wonders if she still thinks about him. He certainly still thinks about her.

Then there’s a skirmish, of sorts, along the edges of the Uncharted Forest. Callum’s only there to begin with to collect Sunstone gems for an elf who’d promised him a handful of Moon Opals in exchange, but he sees a flash of silver; hears the singing of twin blades through the air. His heart stops—

Rayla lets out a cry and drops a butterfly blade—

And his heart begins to hammer once more.

He drops the Sunstone. His feet carry him forward before he has the chance to think about it. A rune comes to life before him, drawn out of instinct rather than out of thought, and a single blinding flash of light later, Rayla’s assailants are gone. Callum watches them flee into the Uncharted Forest, cursing him, and then her, and then him again, before he turns, panting, and offers her a hand.

“Hey,” he greets. She’s thinner than he remembers, and her eyes are less kind than they were when they parted last, but it’s her, and Callum’s lips twitch into a small smile. 

She stares. Her breath huffs past her lips. She looks away. “Callum,” she manages thickly. “You shouldn’t be here.”

“And yet, here I am.” His smile turns into a grimace momentarily, but as angry as he was; as heartbroken, and devastated, and as shattered as she’d left him, his heart swells at the sight of her. His smile widens, just a bit. “Let’s get you fixed up.”

x

Of the many things Callum’s picked up over the last few months, wound care is not one of them, but he does his best regardless and tries not to wince at the way Rayla hisses while he cleans the gash in her shoulder. It’s not the worst he’s seen, nor is it the worst she’s ever received, but still. He doesn’t like the look of blood on her. He likes the fact that it’s her own even less.

“Why are you here?” she asks at last. Her voice is raw. Guilty. 

Callum shrugs and tears a strip of fabric off a spare blanket. “I was running an errand for someone,” he tells her honestly. “But… I’ve been looking for you, too.”

“Why?”

_ Because I still love you _ , he almost says, but he tempers himself. That’s not an answer she’ll accept, no matter how true it is. She knows what she did; how it had almost broken him when she left the first time, and then again, when she left him in that alley. She’s hurting enough without being reminded of it. He breathes out, instead, and settles for, “I still want to help.”

“I don’t want your help.”

“I know you don’t,” says Callum. His tone borders on sharp, and she winces and ducks her head. He relents. “I just… we’re still friends aren’t we?”

She doesn’t answer. 

Callum purses his lips and secures the make-shift bandage with a sigh. She’s seen better days—he doesn’t think he’s ever seen her this battered up since he met her, and his fingers still against her shoulder as he counts the little nicks and scrapes and bruises upon her skin. She keeps her face deliberately tilted away, and a good thing too, Callum realizes, when he catches the way his breath blows against the hair framing her face.

“I missed you,” he mutters without thinking.

She tenses. For a moment, Callum thinks she might pull away. But her breath shakes on the exhale and she doesn’t move. “I missed you too.”

He pauses. His hands linger against her shoulder and the urge to brush her hair out of her face and press her lips to his almost gets the better of him—

But he doesn’t do that. 

He pulls back. It kills him to do it, but she’s not ready yet. For what, he doesn’t even know. “You should get some rest,” he murmurs. “You’ll need it.”

She says nothing, and Callum goes to sleep that night wondering if kissing her might feel the same as it did all those months ago.

x

She’s gone by dawn. He’s not surprised.

  
  


**56d**

At some point, Callum begins to doubt why he’s doing this at all. It’s been a year, he thinks, since he last saw her, injured and alone on the edge of the Uncharted Forest. It’s hard to say for sure, but it was winter then, and it’s winter again now, and all he knows is that his jacket is suddenly shorter at the sleeves and his sketchbook is running out of pages.

They’re mostly of her, these days. Sometimes it's his mother and father, sometimes it's Ez and Bait and Soren, but the last ten or so have been of Rayla, in part because he misses her differently, and in part because he’s afraid he might forget what she looks like.

It’s silly because he knows he won’t. Having an eidetic memory means he’s never forgotten a face to begin with, but it’s as much a curse, at times, because he sees her when he closes her eyes and his chest tightens with that familiar longing for the way things once were.

But they’ll never be that way again. That’s the sad truth of it. The innocence of those days are long gone because he’s seen the world now; he’s seen how cruel and lonely and cold it can be, and how quickly hope disappears from it. Those nights are the worst nights. Those nights are the nights he finds himself wondering if this is worth it at all. Rayla had  _ left _ , after all, and had told him she didn’t love him, and he’d been so  _ sure _ that day, a year and a half ago, that she’d been  _ lying _ , but now—

He doesn’t know. Maybe it’s time to go home. Maybe it’s time to give her up.

He’s put himself through fights, and connected to other arcana, and scoured every inch of every village for signs of her, but it’s always fruitless, always in vain, and… maybe she was right. Perhaps they  _ are  _ done, and it’s time to stop living in the past and time to stop wishing for things long gone.

But one cold winter evening, while he’s camped near the ruins of Elarion on the verge of giving up (for real, this time), she appears once more.

Callum almost thinks she’s a mirage, but he knows she’s not because she’s different from the version of her in his memory. This version of her is longer, leaner, and garbed in the blues of Skywing elves instead of the Moonshadow green he’s been picturing her in this past year and a half. Her cloak is worn and too thin for this weather; her hair is cropped and uneven under the base of her chin; her knuckles are wrapped clumsily with stained bandages; but her eyes—oh, her  _ eyes _ —Callum forgets how to breathe at the sight of them because they’ve seen  _ so much _ , and they’re so tired and so lonely, and yet they’re still unmistakably, unapologetically  _ hers. _

He gets up. He stares. His breath leaves him in one shaking rush.

“Rayla.”

She stares back. Her lip trembles. She looks away. “Callum,” she whispers. “I’m—I can—” Her mouth snaps close and her hands form fists at her sides, before she takes a breath and forces herself to face him properly. “Sorry,” she says, swallowing. “I didn’t—I didn’t realize it was you. I’ll go—”

“No.” Callum starts towards her, and it takes more of his self control than he wants to admit to keep himself from launching at her and pulling her into his arms. “Stay,” he manages. “Please? Just—just for now, even. Just for a little bit.”

She hesitates. Callum counts the heartbeats that pound in his throat while he waits, and it’s the longest five seconds of his life before, at last, she turns away. For one terrifying moment, he thinks she’s going to leave again, but she relaxes her fists, lets her shoulders droop, and nods. “Just for a little bit.”

x

It’s a quiet night. It’d be uncomfortable if Callum wasn’t so grateful she’d agreed. He shares the rations he has with her wordlessly, and she, to his great surprise, accepts without too much of a fight. It’s more than he ever hoped for, which sounds pathetic, but it’s true. 

It wouldn’t have felt right to just give up without one more glimpse of her. He’d hoped he might spot her in town, with someone else, even—some sign that she was okay, and happy, and that she’d moved on so maybe he could too. 

But instead she’s here, and alone, and she’d  _ stayed _ when he asked her too, and that—that lifts the weight a little in his chest. It’s a breath against the dying embers of his resolve. It’s a blank page in his sketchbook he hadn’t realized was there.

It’s hope.

“I shouldn’t stay long,” she says. Her voice is tiny but it shatters the silence around them, and Callum soaks it in and relishes the sound. “I—I have to keep moving. There are things that I have to—” 

“You don’t have to explain,” he says. “This… is something you have to do, isn’t it? It’s not about Viren anymore. It’s about… something else.”

She doesn’t answer. Callum doesn’t really expect her to, and that’s okay. There’s still so much guilt in the way she refuses to look at him, and he knows then that she hasn’t moved on any more than he has. She just… needs time. To allow him to help. To accept his forgiveness. To accept her own.

He gets up. 

Rayla flinches as he draws nearer, but she doesn’t stop him when he drops to his knees beside her, and she doesn’t bat his hands away when he removes his scarf from his neck and wraps it gently around her own.

“You told me once it was good luck,” he murmurs. “Stay safe, okay?”

A pause. A breath. Callum’s hands linger by her jaw, and though she doesn’t look at him, he sees the way she swallows and the way she fights the urge to lean into his touch. Then he pulls away, and the moment is gone. The opportunity is missed. The words he so wants to say hang unspoken in the air.

“Callum.”

When he turns, it looks like she’s one moment away from scrambling for his hands, and in turn, it’s a struggle to keep himself from going back to her.

She purses her lips and touches his scarf. “I’ll bring this back,” she croaks. “I promise.”

He smiles. His throat feels clogged, and his eyes sting, but he  _ smiles _ because it’s the closest to the truth that she’ll allow herself and it floods his system with relief. 

_ I still love you. _

He chuckles. “I’ll be waiting.”

_ I know. _

  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> if you're wondering what '56' means, i have a series i call 'in anticipation' over on tumblr which is usually just a series of ficlets i started in anticipation (geddit) for season 3 and then i just kept the tag bc i didn't want to think up a new one. this started off as ficlet number 56 and then i got yelled at and told to fix it, so i did.
> 
> (there's one more coming, just fyi. consider this series a band-aid until canon fixes what ttm tried to pull)


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